A study of self and direct report perceptions of the skills and performance competencies important for superintendent effectiveness

The major purpose of this study was to determine superintendent effectiveness as perceived by direct reports and superintendents. The relationship between the perceived effectiveness, determined by the researcher's superintendent effectiveness questionnaire, was compared to the Center for Creative Leadership's (CCL) Benchmarks® assessment of leadership skills important to the success of executive leaders. The author developed superintendent effectiveness questionnaire was based on the eight professional standards established in 1993 by the American Association of School Administrators

Deconstructing The Unskilled-And-Unaware Problem: Examining The Effect of Feedback on Misestimation While Disentangling Cognitive Bias From Statistical Artifact

The Unskilled-and-Unaware Problem (UUP) describes the phenomenon where poor performers tend to overestimate their abilities while high performers underestimate theirs. Dunning (2011) argues that the misestimations of low and high performers result from two separate deficits in metacognitive ability. An alternate explanation provided by Krueger and Mueller (2002) suggests that the observed results are a product of the better-than-average (BTA) heuristic and the statistical artifact of regression to the mean. This study controlled for this statistical artifact by reducing measurement error. I also tested the metacognition explanation by examining the effects of different forms of feedback on misestimation. Results generally replicated previous research in that there was a strong negative relationship between performance and misestimation. Additionally, misestimations lessened somewhat over time, demonstrating a calibration effect that was greatest for participants with more extreme scores. However, calibration was not attributable to direct feedback, and calibration was seen even for participants who did not receive feedback. These results imply that individuals may need feedback more verisimilar to that of their everyday experiences to better utilize it to inform their self-assessments and reduce misestimation. This has implications for improving our interactions in instructional and other performance-based settings

A Comparison Of Traditional And Checklist Individualized Education Programs For Articulation Disorders

The purpose of this study was to compare the efficiency, the time economy, and the individuality of a student's program, of a checklist Individualized Education Program (IEP) and a handwritten IEP for articulation disorders. The subjects, a group of Speech-Language pathologists, were asked to select the checklist IEP or the handwritten IEP as their preferred choice of developing IEPs

Aquatics leadership as perceived by African American and European American aquatic leaders

The purpose of this research is to investigate aquatic leadership as perceived and interpreted by African American and European American aquatic leaders. A better understanding of the perceptions of aquatic leadership provides important insight into training and employment of aquatic leaders. The study uses naturalistic inquiry. Three in-depth interviews with four African American and four European American aquatic leaders are presented. Personal histories are reported for each of the informants; a cross-case analysis integrates the interview data and the framing questions. The interviews, personal histories, and cross-case analysis are related to the literature and discussed. The analysis of the participants' narratives identifies three factors which influenced participation in aquatic leadership. Those factors are: (a) influence of others; (b) availability of training; (c) on the job experiences. Three deterrents to participation in aquatics that were identified in the participants' narratives were: (a) the effects of stereotypes on the microculture; (b) the cost of training; and (c) the pay

The Effects Of Behavioral And Cognitive Therapy With Depressed Adolescent Inpatients

The present experiment was conducted to determine the effects of behavioral self-management and cognitive therapy approaches on depressive symptoms with adolescent inpatients

Facts And Circumstances Leading To The Conversion Of York Technical Education Center To A Comprehensive Community College

The purpose of this thesis is to report the facts and circumstances leading to the conversion of York Technical Education Center from a strictly technical-skill oriented educational program to one of an open door, comprehensive, community-based, performance-oriented, post-secondary institution

Constitutive Type VI Secretion System Expression Gives Vibrio cholerae Intra- and Interspecific Competitive Advantages

The type VI secretion system (T6SS) mediates protein translocation across the cell membrane of Gram-negative bacteria, including Vibrio cholerae – the causative agent of cholera. All V. cholerae strains examined to date harbor gene clusters encoding a T6SS. Structural similarity and sequence homology between components of the T6SS and the T4 bacteriophage cell-puncturing device suggest that the T6SS functions as a contractile molecular syringe to inject effector molecules into prokaryotic and eukaryotic target cells. Regulation of the T6SS is critical. A subset of V. cholerae strains, including the clinical O37 serogroup strain V52, express T6SS constitutively. In contrast, pandemic strains impose tight control that can be genetically disrupted: mutations in the quorum sensing gene luxO and the newly described regulator gene tsrA lead to constitutive T6SS expression in the El Tor strain C6706. In this report, we examined environmental V. cholerae isolates from the Rio Grande with regard to T6SS regulation. Rough V. cholerae lacking O-antigen carried a nonsense mutation in the gene encoding the global T6SS regulator VasH and did not display virulent behavior towards Escherichia coli and other environmental bacteria. In contrast, smooth V. cholerae strains engaged constitutively in type VI-mediated secretion and displayed virulence towards prokaryotes (E. coli and other environmental bacteria) and a eukaryote (the social amoeba Dictyostelium discoideum). Furthermore, smooth V. cholerae strains were able to outcompete each other in a T6SS-dependent manner. The work presented here suggests that constitutive T6SS expression provides V. cholerae with an advantage in intraspecific and interspecific competition.Canadian Institutes of Health Research (Operating Grant MOP-84473)Alberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research (Alberta Innovates-Health Solutions, Endowment Fund)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (grant MD001091-01)National Institutes of Health (U.S.) (grant GM068855-02)Olegario V. Rana FellowshipAlberta Heritage Foundation for Medical Research (Alberta Innovates-Health Solutions Graduate Studentships

Contribution of the Type VI Secretion System Encoded in SPI-19 to Chicken Colonization by Salmonella enterica Serotypes Gallinarum and Enteritidis

Salmonella Gallinarum is a pathogen with a host range specific to poultry, while Salmonella Enteritidis is a broad host range pathogen that colonizes poultry sub-clinically but is a leading cause of gastrointestinal salmonellosis in humans and many other species. Despite recent advances in our understanding of the complex interplay between Salmonella and their hosts, the molecular basis of host range restriction and unique pathobiology of Gallinarum remain largely unknown. Type VI Secretion System (T6SS) represents a new paradigm of protein secretion that is critical for the pathogenesis of many Gram-negative bacteria. We recently identified a putative T6SS in the Salmonella Pathogenicity Island 19 (SPI-19) of Gallinarum. In Enteritidis, SPI-19 is a degenerate element that has lost most of the T6SS functions encoded in the island. In this work, we studied the contribution of SPI-19 to the colonization of Salmonella Gallinarum strain 287/91 in chickens. Non-polar deletion mutants of SPI-19 and the clpV gene, an essential T6SS component, colonized the ileum, ceca, liver and spleen of White Leghorn chicks poorly compared to the wild-type strain after oral inoculation. Return of SPI-19 to the ΔSPI-19 mutant, using VEX-Capture, complemented this colonization defect. In contrast, transfer of SPI-19 from Gallinarum to Enteritidis resulted in transient increase in the colonization of the ileum, liver and spleen at day 1 post-infection, but at days 3 and 5 post-infection a strong colonization defect of the gut and internal organs of the experimentally infected chickens was observed. Our data indicate that SPI-19 and the T6SS encoded in this region contribute to the colonization of the gastrointestinal tract and internal organs of chickens by Salmonella Gallinarum and suggest that degradation of SPI-19 T6SS in Salmonella Enteritidis conferred an advantage in colonization of the avian host

Genetic Analysis of Anti-Amoebae and Anti-Bacterial Activities of the Type VI Secretion System in Vibrio cholerae

A type VI secretion system (T6SS) was recently shown to be required for full virulence of Vibrio cholerae O37 serogroup strain V52. In this study, we systematically mutagenized each individual gene in T6SS locus and characterized their functions based on expression and secretion of the hemolysin co-regulated protein (Hcp), virulence towards amoebae of Dictyostelium discoideum and killing of Escherichia coli bacterial cells. We group the 17 proteins characterized in the T6SS locus into four categories: twelve (VipA, VipB, VCA0109–VCA0115, ClpV, VCA0119, and VasK) are essential for Hcp secretion and bacterial virulence, and thus likely function as structural components of the apparatus; two (VasH and VCA0122) are regulators that are required for T6SS gene expression and virulence; another two, VCA0121 and valine-glycine repeat protein G 3 (VgrG-3), are not essential for Hcp expression, secretion or bacterial virulence, and their functions are unknown; the last group is represented by VCA0118, which is not required for Hcp expression or secretion but still plays a role in both amoebae and bacterial killing and may therefore be an effector protein. We also showed that the clpV gene product is required for Dictyostelium virulence but is less important for killing E. coli. In addition, one vgrG gene (vgrG-2) outside of the T6SS gene cluster was required for bacterial killing but another (vgrG-1) was not. However, a bacterial killing defect was observed when vgrG-1 and vgrG-3 were both deleted. Several genes encoded in the same putative operon as vgrG-1 and vgrG-2 also contribute to virulence toward Dictyostelium but have a smaller effect on bacterial killing. Our results provide new insights into the functional requirements of V. cholerae's T6SS in the context of secretion as well as killing of bacterial and eukaryotic phagocytic cells

4th Biennial Employment Law Institute

Materials from the 4th Biennial Employment Law Institute held by UK/CLE in June 1994